Beer: Ratings & Reviews

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Reviews by wl0307:

4/5rDev n/alook: 4 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 4

Brought back down south from the Durham Brewery during my last trip to Co. Durham, winter 2012, this is said to be an one-off Christmas brew (2012) mixing Durham’s Temptation RIS with chillies, lots of them added during the primary fermentation process, then the beer is bottled and underwent the secondary fermentation in the brewery’s warm room. This is one of only 1000 bottles produced, by the way! Coming in a 330ml slim brown bottle, bottle-conditioned; BB 01/2017, served cool in a broad-rimmed goblet.

A: pitch black in colour, coming with a thin layer of brown foam with good retention, on top of an unknown level of carbonation.S: black dates, roast nuts, treacle, sweet coffee, black malts and raisin-y dried berries upfront, buttressed by a very light tinge of dried chillies, lurking in the background. Given a good swirl, the rich jammy roast nutty malts come more aromatic and pronounced, and so does the chilli undertone.T: immediately hot(!) and robust dark-malty at the same time, on top of a surprisingly soothingly refreshing carbonation. The flavour is in every bit like Temptation but with much less fruit esters, featuring roast malts, black prunes and dates/stone-fruit elements mainly, while the finish gives my palate the full satisfaction of drinking a chilli-infused RIS, which is warming and stimulating, esp. on the deep and long swallow, while the coffee-ish and licorice-ish aftertaste is not to be missed either.M&O: very well-conditioned in the bottle – thanks to Durham’s insistence on complete secondary fermentation done in the brewery (true to the Belgian tradition) – so the mouthfeel is in fact very refreshing and softly carbonated throughout the drink; the body is full, the flavour is full, and the chillies are bold, which I don’t think would appeal to any person who doesn’t like chillies in general, but certainly could warm the throat and heart of a chilli and RIS lover like me.